


Shiver

by LamiaCalls



Category: Betrayal at House on the Hill
Genre: Gen, Haunted House, Horror, Ice, Winter-Themed Horror, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:35:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28424844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LamiaCalls/pseuds/LamiaCalls
Summary: Josiah is in the Junk Room when an icy chill comes over the house. It's getting colder by the minute, and there's not much time.
Relationships: Josiah Longfellow & Ox Bellows & Jenny LeClerc
Comments: 4
Kudos: 2
Collections: Holiday Horror 2020





	Shiver

**Author's Note:**

  * For [This_is_My_Sock](https://archiveofourown.org/users/This_is_My_Sock/gifts).



> If you would like to play this Haunt, I've also posted the Secrets to Survival guide under the title "Haunt 7B: Frost Bite" and put it in a series with this. But this also stands alone, without a need to play, I just thought it'd be fun to try and write one!
> 
> I recommend reading this _before_ the Haunt guide, as the guide contains spoilers for the win/lose conditions of the Haunt!

Professor Josiah Longfellow was in a room full of bric-a-brac when Ox came through. The boy — and he was a boy, as much as he seemed to think himself a man — stopped to lean over Josiah.

“Whatcha looking at, Prof?” Ox asked, craning his neck.

“I was impressed by their crystal goblets,” Josiah said. He moved aside so Ox, too, could see in the cabinet he had slung open. He held the crystal up to the light, watching the flames of the chandelier’s candles refract and throw themselves across the walls like splashes of paint. “Some of the finest I’ve ever seen. I would be aghast if they lacked a wine cellar. Wouldn’t you, Mr. Bellows?”

“I guess,” Ox said, wrinkling his nose. “It’s really pretty, though.”

The boy, while brighter than most gave him credit for, never seemed much interested in the finer things in life. But he did seem to appreciate all things that shone. Josiah placed the glass in Ox’s outstretched hand, and watched as he marvelled over it, jaw slightly slack.

“What do you have there, Mr. Bellows?” Josiah motioned to the well-worn book in Ox’s hand. Ox wasn’t much of a reader — or, at least, never seemed to have done of the Psychology reading the Josiah assigned him — so it was a strange thing to see him grip it so tightly.

“Some musty book,” Ox said, barely tearing his eyes away from the crystal. “I found it in the library. Kind of threw itself out of the shelf at me. Kinda strange, actually.”

“Strange indeed,” Josiah said. “May I?”

“Sure,” Ox said, handing the book over. He placed the glass down on the dust-laden table. Josiah couldn’t help but wonder that the whole mansion might have looked marvellous in full regalia. But even as he wondered at what this storage room might have been — a drawing room, perhaps? — he realised he had trouble imagining the house as full of life. Surely it had always stood, alone on the cliff face and turning itself away from anyone who looked at it. On the approach, in the front seat of Jennifer LeClerc’s rundown car, Josiah had noted the lifeless windows that told him nothing was alive inside, the houses’ visage free of vines and moss, as if even that died when coming into contact.

It was nonsense, of course. A trick of the mind, and no more. He had known the place was said to be haunted, and so his mind provided the thrill of terror. Fear was no more than light, refracted through glass, making shapes on the wall of the mind.

He looked down at the book in his hand. It was old, so old in fact that no title or author remained on the cover. It was leather-bound and soft with age. Carefully, he opened the yellowing pages, which threatened to crack even under his gentle touches.

His head swum with what was there. Symbols, endless tessellating symbols, nonsense and not of this world. The more he tried to concentrate, to look at even one long enough to decipher its true shape and distinguish it from the symbols that surrounded it, the sicker he felt.

“You alright, Prof?”

Ox was looking at him, concerned.

“Fine, fine,” Josiah said. There was no need to worry the boy. Josiah glanced back down, but the strangest thing had happen when he did: the symbols were no longer a jumble, no longer painful to behold. No, in fact, as he peered further, he realised he could not only distinguish the drawings, but could almost understand them…

“I’m going to keep exploring,” Ox said. Josiah looked back at him. “Did Jen say what she wanted us to look for? Just anything odd, right?”

“Ah, I believe ‘signs of life’ is the phrase she used,” Josiah said. He clapped the book closed. “But anything odd will surely be of interest too.”

“Right,” Ox said. He looked like he wanted to say something else, but his attention caught on something behind Josiah. “Huh.”

Josiah frowned and turned to the french doors at his back.

“What’s wrong, Mr. Bellows?”

“I swear that was just a normal wall with like, a closed wooden door,” Ox said slowly, his frown deepening. “I definitely didn’t see the balcony when I came in here.”

Josiah looked between Ox and the doors. He had gotten so swept up in inspecting the glassware and trinkets that he hadn’t been paying much attention. And now the book had thoroughly diverted him.

“Must have been a trick of the light,” Josiah supplied. “Or your expectations after exploring quite so many room. I’ve heard you thumping about all evening. Nothing has staid your attention so far, I take it?”

Ox looked away from the balcony.

“Nah, it’s all old stuff,” Ox said dismissively. “I did find like, a gym, but it was full of all this old shit.”

“Language, Mr. Bellows,” Josiah said, but he knew it was useless. The younger generation had no sense of decency around their elders. He had to admire it, in some ways.

Ox just shrugged his huge shoulders apologetically, and began to move towards the balcony doors. Josiah let him go. It was a good excuse to pore over the book a little more, and so he ignored the creaking hinges of the french doors to crack open the spine.

Understanding was still difficult — each page he glanced at, his head swum a little more, and trying to distinguish the lines was like wading through molasses. It took focus, concentration. But he started to realise that the book was about the very house they stood in. The scribbles were not madness, but a code, which foretold of bad things. Very bad things indeed, that had happened within these very walls…

“Professor?”

Josiah wanted to ignore Ox, in favour of the book, but hearing his title used in full made him look up. Ox was back inside now, but with the doors swung open, and he was shivering something fierce.

“Is everything okay, Ox?” Josiah said gently. “You look as if you’ve seen a ghost.”

Ox shook his head.

“Will you go out there?”

Josiah stiffened.

“What ever for?”

“Look,” Ox said, and pointed to the door jamb, the glass, then the floor right next to the doors. Josiah stepped forward to look, brow drawn into a frown, unsure what he was looking for until—

“Ah!” Josiah exclaimed. “Is that frost?”

Ox nodded. “And it’s freezing out there. Like you wouldn’t believe.”

“It is December…” Josiah said. But this was a boy he had seen running in the snow on campus in nought but a tank top in the past, so for him to remark on the weather was something. Josiah would have to see for himself, kicking up dust as he walked out.

He immediately jumped back in, wrapping his arms around him. Even his tweeds had not been enough to stop the cold from penetrating.

“My lord,” Josiah said, through chattering teeth. “It’s deathly cold out there!”

“Yeah,” Ox said. His face was stitched with worry and confusion but Josiah was shivering too much to comfort him. “It wasn’t that cold when we were out there earlier, I swear.”

“It was not or we would’ve frozen half to death before we’d even got out there.”

Josiah looked down at his fingers: they were white-cold, and so he wasn’t even sure he was exaggerating.

“Let’s close the doors,” he said, worrying at his lip. The frost had slivered further inside. He let the boy do it — his countenance was surely stronger than Josiah’s and could presumably withstand the chill.

“That’s weird, right?” Ox said, as he pulled the bolt closed on the doors. “Wasn’t it?”

Josiah wanted to say no, to settle Ox. But he wasn’t so sure, and as he leaned forward to peer through the window, he felt his stomach knot a little tighter.

“Do you think it odd, Mr. Bellows, that we can’t see the lights from town from here?” Josiah said slowly.

Josiah could see the boy’s reflection in the glass, as he turned to look with Josiah. He frowned.

“Are we facing the right way?”

Josiah resisted the urge to snort. “Yes. We are facing east, towards the town. And what’s more… I see not a single star, nor the moon. Do you?”

“N—no, Prof,” Ox said. His voice full of holes.

“Aye, let’s get back from these doors, shall we?” Josiah said suddenly. The symbols that warned of danger in the book were dancing in his mind. He grabbed Ox’s hand, and pulled them back.

“Prof?” Ox said, staring at the floor.

“I see it,” Josiah said, gulping. The frost that had just lined the door jamb and threshold was beginning to snake and curl along the floor. It was like they had let a beast in, one made of bone-cold.

“What do you think it is?” Ox said. “It can’t be that cold out there…”

“Ah,” Josiah said. He was trying to weigh his words carefully, to not seem a madman. They had already encountered one earlier in their exploration, who had scared the stuffing out of them before running into the dark recesses of the house. They did not need another in their party. But it was the only thing he could think to say, that would ring true: “I fear it is an otherworldly cold, Mr. Bellows. One that means us ill-will.”

He glanced at Ox as they retreated to the doorway of the junk room, expecting skepticism. Young folks tended to be suspicious and skeptical by nature these days, if trying to teach wondrous studies to his students was anything to go by. But Ox looked at him, wide-eyed, for only a moment, before nodding gravely and looking back at the frost, which had taken over half the room’s floor and ceiling already.

“We should get Jenny,” he said.

***

Josiah let Ox go ahead of him, tearing through the rooms and calling out for Jenny. Though he thought perhaps it were not best to disturb anything anew from the house, Josiah supposed it was already too late to worry about something awakening. Clearly, just stumbling out onto the balcony was enough to unearth some malignant force.

Since he wasn’t running, he could certainly tell that the house had taken on a chill already. And when he stopped briefly, after chasing Ox down the steps into the foyer on the ground floor, to rest and breathe, he felt the cold even more keenly. No, it seemed best to keep moving.

He pulled his jacket closer to him, prying his collar up to protect his neck, and followed the sound of Ox’s feet slapping against the old wooden floors.

They finally stumbled in on her in the study, where she was hurriedly slamming closed patio doors.

“Oh shit,” Ox was saying. “Have you let it in?”

Jenny looked up; her face was pale, her eyelashes flecked with frost.

“I didn’t know, I’m so—“

“You couldn’t have,” Josiah said quickly. In his best commanding teacher voice, he said: “Get away from the doors! Quickly now!”

She complied without a second’s hesitation, moving closer to Ox and Josiah.

“What is it?” Jenny said, her voice low as if the house might hear her. Josiah didn’t think it unlikely that it _was_ listening.

“Some kind of unnatural frost,” Josiah said. “It moves quickly, we should take our leave.”

Josiah let Jenny and Ox race ahead through the dining room and library; he could only keep up so much and needed to conserve his energy.

“What do we do about it?” Jenny asked, looking back at Josiah, her face knitted with worry.

“We need to get out.”

“I’m afraid I don’t think that that is such a good idea,” Josiah said gravelly. They had stopped in the entrance hall. It looked darker and less grand than when they had arrived. “If we let this frost out…who knows what is to happen? Besides, it seems to be coming from _outside._ No, I think we need to deal with it — defeat it. That book you gave me, it said something about not leaving unfinished business in the house, lest it consume us later.”

Ox looked on the verge on tears. Jenny straightened her neck.

“Well. Okay. So what do we need?” she said, her voice turning matter-of-fact. She had such a good head on her shoulders, it’s why Josiah was so fond of her. “Something hot, right? To fight it back?”

“Do we know for a fact it responds to fire?” Josiah said.

“I saw a torch in one of the rooms back that way,” Jenny said, pointing across the hall, in the opposite direction from whence they’d come. “It was really creepy though, covered in…well, I think it was blood.”

“Hm,” Josiah said. “It’s risky to even get close enough to test this.”

“I can do it,” Ox said. His face was twisted with fear, but his voice was steady. “I’m fast. And it’s not like I need to get close to try it.”

Josiah was going to object — to put his students at risk, that was truly violating his role as their guardian and professor. But these circumstances were exceptional, and if anyone were fit for the task, he could think of none more likely than Ox.

“Okay, Mr. Bellows,” Josiah said firmly. “Then you shall be our guinea pig. Just, please, be careful. I know it’s easy to think yourself indestructible at your age, but—“

“I know how easy it is to get hurt,” Ox said. Something like pain or grief flitted across his face, for a second, but not long enough for Josiah to decipher it. Besides, this was hardly the time for investigating the troubles of his wards. “I’ll be careful, Prof.”

Jenny gave him a watery smile. “The bloody room — it’s just down the hallway at the end there.”

“Thanks, Jen.”

Ox took off without another word. Jenny turned to Josiah.

“What shall we do while he looks?”

“Ah, well, we should prepare for a positive outcome, I should think. For which, I have an idea, but we’ll need to find a way into the basement.”

“Righto,” Jenny said, and followed him into the foyer.

***

It wasn’t long before they found it: an old elevator. Admittedly, Josiah was not most keen to get into something that looked like it would surely plummet the three of them to their deaths, but desperate times called for… And besides, it didn’t do to show any fear. He didn’t need anything else to frighten Ox or Jenny — though, the latter seemed perfectly capable of remaining calm without his assistance.

“Excellent,” Josiah said, as the doors slid open. “Let’s get Ox, and see how he’s getting on.”

Luckily, the elevator had been not far from the foyer, and Ox was just emerging from the library when they’d backtracked.

“It worked!” he hollered, pumping a fist into the air.

“Jolly good,” Josiah replied, and, for the first time all evening, gave him a genuine smile. He hadn’t known what he would suggest had it failed. “Bring the torch with you, let’s move!”

The elevator was just as creaky as he’d feared. It wobbled something fierce as each stepped into it and Josiah couldn’t quite believe he was suggesting they use it. But he pressed the “B” button firmly, gulped down some air, and hoped for the best. He tried not to think about what might happen if it swung too widely, and Ox lost grip of the torch that lit the small, dark cabin.

The elevator was agonisingly slow, like a great metal beast waking from hibernation after a long, harsh winter. But with great, echoing creaks and groans, it deposited them onto the lower floor of that horrible house.

“We’re looking for a furnace,” Josiah told them, as the doors opened, revealing that they had in fact survived the journey in tact, by some miracle. “Old houses like these, they always have furnaces. It’s how they heated the place.”

“Uhhh,” Ox looked at him, his lips pursed. “What does a furnace look like?”

Josiah fought the urge to shake his head at the young man’s ignorance. He supposed with central heating being all the rage, there was little reason for Ox to have encountered one.

“It will be a large metal box, likely, and full of coal, wood or ashes,” Josiah said. “I’m confident you’ll work it out once you see it.”

“And why exactly are we looking for it?” Jenny asked, following the other two out of the elevator and into the dusty basement hallway.

“Because, I think we can overheat it,” Josiah said. He tried not to be too dismissive; her skepticism was likely borne of fear, rather than doubt for his knowledge. “It should warm the place up enough — and, if all else fails, it will help us burn the house to the ground.”

In his periphery, he saw Ox and Jenny exchange looks at that, but he was going to ignore it. They clearly hadn’t grasped yet that any action that saved them was action justified.

“Now,” he said, peering through a darkened doorway. “It would be quicker to split up, but given that we have but one torch between us, we should probably stick together.”

“Right,” Ox said. “I’ll go first.”

And he plunged into the nearest doorway, nary a thought. Jenny followed, and Josiah brought up the rear, hoping his eyes would quickly adjust to the murky darkness, which was thick as snow.

They tramped down together in silence.

“Dead end!” Ox called, not thirty feet in. They’d passed rooms, but none yet had contained their possible saviour.

Josiah let the two young people get ahead of him again; keeping the torch in front ensured they wouldn’t get lost — and while it had been a straight hallway, Josiah was not sure he trusted the house not to play dirty tricks with them. Ox led them back out into the room with the elevator.

They went to the left this time, taking the door directly opposite the elevator. Two doors in, and Ox stopped.

“Is this it, Prof?” he said, his voice tinged with the high-pitch tones of hope.

“Let me see,” Josiah said, moving forward. He didn’t want to get his hopes up without a good look.

But there it was: a huge, gaping metal maw, ready to breathe fire and warmth back into the house. Good thing too: Josiah’s hands were starting to numb, though he tried to ignore it.

“That’s it!”

Ox whooped, almost singing Josiah as he threw the torch up.

“Careful,” Josiah warned. “Let’s get this thing lit.”

“Uhhh, how do we do that now?” Ox asked.

“Simple,” Josiah said.

He instructed Jenny and Ox to move the bags of coal along the walls into the waiting mouth of the furnace, then told Ox to hold the lit end of his torch in.

They stood, waiting and tense, as the coals slowly caught. But it was taking too long.

“Ah, perhaps there is something in here…” Josiah said, sensing the impatience shuffling of his wards. He cast his eyes about, but his vision was good in normal lighting, and poor in the darkness.

“What about this?” Jenny said. She picked something up, that had been leaning against the wall. “It’s a bellows, right?”

Josiah squinted and reached out. In his hands, he could at least tell that it was right. “That’s it!”

He gripped the two handles, and pumped it into the furnace. But it wasn’t enough; his strength was not…well, it was not _literal_ strength. He instead pushed the bellows into the hands of his most appropriately named student.

“Mr. Bellows, would you do the honours?” he said smartly.

“What do I do?” Ox said, his voice streaked with panic. He handed the still-blazing torch over to Josiah. “Just pump them?”

He gave an experimental pump, the the coals glowed in response.

“That’s right! Just like that! Quick as you can now,” he said. He didn’t want his own panic to intrude on his instruction, but it was hard. It was dark enough that they might not notice the frost if it was encroaching on their space, not until it was too late. He didn’t even know if it was down here yet.

Ox pumped away, stronger than Josiah by several miles. And the coals, in response, began to pick up and pass the flames, until the whole furnace was alight with them.

“That’s wonderful!” Josiah said, feeling real, actual relief. They might be okay. And with the ever-growing glow of the furnace, plus now possession of the torch, he could look and confirm that there was not yet any frost in there. He just hoped it wouldn’t block their exit to the house itself. But that was something to worry about later — for now, he began to throw more coals onto the fire with his free-hand, satisfied in watching them catch quickly. Jenny joined him, finding a shovel in the corner of the room, now that it was lit, and dropping whole shovelfuls onto the fire.

It wasn’t too long until the whole thing was ablaze, so bright and hot that Josiah’s eyes were watering, and he could see, through the tears, that Jenny and Ox were looking away from it too, Ox barely hanging onto his bellows.

“That’s enough, I suspect!” Josiah said, shouting to be heard over the rumbling of the furnace. He fiddled with it, checking everything was in order for it to overheat. It was. “Let’s go!”

They didn’t need any other encouragement; they let him lead the way with the torch. Josiah kept his eyes peeled for frost, but seemingly it had not gotten down there yet. The elevator, too, was free of it. “Up we go!”

The elevator took even longer this time it seemed, and it was all Josiah could do not to shout in impatience. But eventually, they found themselves back on the ground floor. No frost in that room yet, but it was markedly cold, especially after the warmth of the furnace room. Luckily, he could hear the radiators groaning into life, old and infirm as they were.

“Let’s get out here,” Josiah said firmly. “And I’ll light everything up as we go.”

“Really?” Ox said.

“Really. We must ensure this stuff is burnt up, and has no chance of following us.”

Jenny too looked like she might argue, but then she nodded decisively, if not a little doubtfully, as Josiah.

“Let’s go,” she said, her voice steady as ever.

Ox led the way. Josiah found there was a pleasure in burning things in the awful, musty house, one that had come close to trying to kill him. Everything was so old and dry that it was easy to ignite curtains, tablecloths, sofas, all sorts of things. But Ox backed off before they could get into the foyer, almost knocking Jenny and, by extension, Josiah off balance.

“What is it, Mr. Bellows?” Josiah asked.

“Look.”

He was pointing downwards, where Josiah could see the wooden floorboards were marked with white. Frost. And, indeed, now they had stopped, Josiah could feel the chill creeping into his bones, and see that their breath was coming out in puffs of mist.

Josiah wanted to say they should backtrack, but it was too late for that: behind him, the roaring of a house on fire warned him not to hesitate.

“Take the torch,” he said, shoving it into Ox’s hands. Again, he used his best teaching voice to command them. “Keep it low to the ground — and move quickly! We haven’t a second to spare.”

Ox grimaced, but then took off running, Jenny following. Josiah was glad now he had conserved his energy so that he too could sprint — not as fast as them, but keeping not far back, at least. The flame licked against the floor, and Josiah could see the frost melt and jump back, as if afraid of the fire.

He looked up in time to see the frost thicken on the walls, crackling as it froze the pictures there. He was not one to personify that which had no brain, but had he been, he would have thought it rather angry, and showing them its displeasure at their trickery.

But it was too little, too late. Josiah smiled. It should have been more aggressive much quicker, if it wanted to best him.

Then they were at the door. Ox hissed as he threw it open — Josiah suspected the metal door knob must have been very cold indeed.

The cold night air welcomed them with open arms; not deathly, unearthly cold, either, but the natural December chill that he had never been more grateful for. He puffed lungfuls of it, sweet and free of the dust and mold of the house. He could see too, as they ran up the driveway, Jenny’s rusted car and, beyond that, the glorious lights of the town below them. What a joy it was, to be alive, and to be free.

Ox skidded to a halt, and Josiah and Jenny both followed suit.

They all turned, in unison.

Josiah wasn’t sure how long they stood there, shivering and standing close, but it was long enough to see the orange glow fill all the ground floor windows, and one of the upstairs ones besides. It would be a wonder if the whole town below them didn’t soon see it blazing — he wondered if anyone would come to save it. By then, it would be too late anyway, and surely the whole thing would be a pile of wood by morning — if they were lucky. There was clearly evil in that house, and Josiah was glad to be rid of it.

“Let’s go home,” Jenny said. He looked at her, lit by the warm fire. She looked tired; Ox did too, and Josiah wondered if the night’s events played on his face also. No doubt they did.

They bundled themselves into Jenny’s car, Ox lying on the backseat. It took a few turns, but eventually the engine started. Josiah watched the house in the wing view mirror as they exited the long drive and got back onto the road towards town.

He never did find out if they had a wine cellar.


End file.
